


Shatter

by StormyNight108



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort, More characters to appear later, actual cutie cinnamon rolls too precious for this world, toddler skelebros
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-12-04
Updated: 2015-12-04
Packaged: 2018-05-04 23:20:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,681
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5352158
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StormyNight108/pseuds/StormyNight108
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After losing their father through space and time and forgetting any memory of his existence, Sans and Papyrus only have each other to lean on. For a while, despite having struggles, everything is okay. Well, it was, until hints of Gaster start showing up everywhere, and Sans is determined to fix this machine.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Shatter

**Author's Note:**

> Sans is about ten years old  
> Papyrus is six  
> Gaster is...  
> Gaster
> 
> This story is a collaboration between me (Rabbitwithacloak.tumblr.com) and my friend Kasey (Wanderingnova24.tumblr.com, who doesn't have an AO3), and we're going to try to get this fic on a regular update schedule, so stay tuned for that.
> 
> Otherwise, hope you enjoy!

A sleek, white laboratory hallway stretched out in front of him, ending at a fork turning opposite directions, and a door on the wall in the center. Walking with a slow pace, his feet clacking against the marble floor, Sans found himself wandering alone.

He had just been asleep prior, causing him to squint under the fluorescent light that seemed to be everywhere. He was still clad in pajamas, eyes tired with a yawn at the back of his throat. When he reached the door, he leaned against the doorknob for a moment before pushing it open, eyes relaxing under the darker shade of light. “Dad?” He called out.

A taller skeleton poked his head out from above the machine to the farther back of the room, and Sans briefly wondered if his father had slept at all since the night before. He hadn’t seemed to be getting much sleep lately, what with that project he seemingly couldn’t get his hands off of. It seemed to have consumed his life outside of what he was already doing for his sons. “Sans, you’re awake!” He signed, rounding the experimenting table and approaching the child. “How do you feel?”

“Tired… and my eye hurts.” He rubbed at it.

Gaster kneeled down and took his son’s face in his hands, inspecting the eye for himself. Sans felt his father’s gentle, delicate hands lift his chin up and sideways, before he took them back and signed in response. “That is good. Come, let us study it further to make sure it is reacting correctly.”

Sans obeyed his father, walking father into the room and closing the door behind him, shutting the two of them in muted light. His limbs felt sluggish and slow with each movement, and he felt his eyes droop with exhaustion. Maybe he should have just gone back to bed.

Climbing onto the bed in the room, he wished he could have done just that. Instead, he laid down on his back and stared back at the light that shone down in his face. Gaster appeared a moment later in his field of vision, hooking something up to his arm and then turning Sans’ face towards him. “Are you alright, my son?” he signed towards him, and Sans blinked a few times before realizing he should probably reply.

“Tired.” He muttered, and Gaster watched him for a few moments before disappearing once more, writing something down on a notepad in the far corner of Sans’ eye.

He must have fallen back asleep at one point, because Gaster was suddenly above him again, patting the side of his head. Rousing awake and squinting under the light, Sans moaned and turned his head to the other side, feeling bile in the back of his throat and nausea in the pit of his non-existent stomach.

Gaster rolled his chair to the other side so he could be in Sans’ field of vision, and then made sure his eyes were open before signing. “Your eye seems normal, but your body’s defenses seem to have dropped. May we test your attacks?”

“Feel sick.”

Sans realized a moment later that he felt worse than sick. He felt ready to die. Gaster looked very concerned at his confession, as Sans never liked admitting to sickness, and the scientist turned to attach something to his chest. The young child didn’t fight it, and instead closed his eyes once more, before being roused awake again a few moments later.

“My son… your hit point count has dropped significantly since last night.”

Sans was too tired to react.

That was the last thing Gaster really said for a while. After that he was all over the place, looking through different monitors, taking notes, and injecting some type of substance in Sans’ arm. It didn’t really do much. Sans kept his eyes closed for the majority of it, slipping in and out of consciousness while his father fluttered around the room.

A hand settled on his shoulder, causing him to open his eyes again, feeling groggy. “Sit up please.” His father requested, and Sans did his best.

He put a hand over his ribcage, feeling a slight burning sensation bubbling beneath. It was uncomfortable, but Sans didn’t feel any adrenaline or worry. He only felt worn. “I need to log your attacks.” His father said simply, holding out a hand to help Sans up from the bed.

When his feet hit the ground his knees buckled, causing him to fall over into his father’s reflexive arms. He was too tired to wonder what was wrong with him, though he knew he probably should. The room spun.

The small skeleton leaned heavily on his father as they walked to the father end of the large room. They approached the small door that would put Sans in an isolated room to use his powers, while Gaster had the ability to watch from the glass wall connecting between. Stepping into the confined space, Gaster let Sans lean against the wall for support before he retreated back behind the door.

His father signed when he was ready through the glass, and Sans put a hand to his ribcage again.

He took a deep, fatigued breath.

Raising a hand to summon his powers, he felt the charge build up inside of his soul right before he felt a sudden burst of pain explode within him. He cried out, terror seizing through his bones and pulling him to his knees, with a scream ripping through the air and bouncing off the sleek walls. His eye burned with ethereal fire, scorching the sides of his eye socket and spreading through the entirety of his pounding skull, where his hands had gone to clutch, feeling his skull and finding it slightly moist and sticky instead of solid. The room shook with his screams, his body lowering itself to where his forehead rested against the cold ground in an attempt to soothe the fiery pain, and he felt himself shake violently.

A sudden explosion and the sound of shattering glass ripped through the air and he jerked his head up from the ground, finding himself staring into the side profile of a giant beast’s skull. Its eyes were pure white, staring straight at something to the left of his vision, its jaws agape and smoking as if it had just fired a shot of energy. Sans already felt the pain within him ebbing away, and whirled his head around to see what had just happened.

The glass wall separating the two rooms was completely broken, in a chaotic pile of broken shards and pieces that were scattered across the floors. The giant skull that had appeared was gone now, with no proof that it had ever been there in the first place. It took Sans all of four seconds to realize that his father was no longer standing at the glass, nor was he anywhere near it. “Dad?” He called out, getting to his feet and putting a hand out to the wall as the world gave a sudden lurch.

Something began to beep across the room, and Sans slowly worked his way to the door, avoiding the bits and pieces of glass best he could. “Dad, are you okay?” He felt panic grip his heart for a moment as he swept his gaze across the small lab before spotting the machine his father had been working on. Its lights had begun to flash.

It was a large machine, but nothing too monstrous. Sans had never bothered asking about this particular experiment. His father always told him about the experiments he was working on, always explaining how they worked and what he did to make them, but for some reason, he had been strangely silent about this one.

He looked into the gap of the machine now.

Gaster lay there, awkwardly propped up against the various buttons and controls that lined the walls of the machine, the front of his coat and face scorched as though he had been burned. Sans reached out, eyes wide. “Dad…” He muttered, trying to wake him up. He glanced up, looking back to where he had once been standing by the glass. Sans had never summoned an attack like that before… It had sent his father this far back into the room.

One piece of the machine exploded.

It sent Sans flying several feet backwards through a thick wall of smoke, and a few papers on the desktop nearby caught fire. He landed with a heavy thud, his back hitting the wall on the opposite side of the room. He lay dazed for several seconds before his eyes snapped up. “Dad!” He yelled with a shriek, struggling to get back to his feet. His dad was unconscious within the workings of the machine, he-

Another piece exploded. Sans shielded his eyes.

The entire machine combusted.

The world drowned in darkness.

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

A sleek, white laboratory hallway stretched out in front of him, ending at a fork turning opposite directions, and a door on the wall in the center. Walking with a slow pace, his feet clacking against the marble floor, Sans found himself wandering alone.

He had just been asleep prior, causing him to squint under the fluorescent light that seemed to be everywhere. He was still clad in pajamas, eyes tired with a yawn at the back of his throat. When he reached the door, he leaned against the doorknob for a moment before pushing it open, eyes relaxing under the darker shade of light. A word was on the tip of his tongue, but he stopped, suddenly forgetting what he was going to say.

Nothing stirred within the room and Sans stopped, leaning against the doorframe and looking over everything, as if expecting something to be here. However, he realized a moment later, he didn’t really have any reason to be up. Papyrus was asleep, and no one else should be in this laboratory.

He turned back, shutting the door completely before heading back in the direction of his bedroom.

He rubbed at his eye.


End file.
